Michael Bolton's 'One World One Love' Comes Out March 30

NEW ON CD

Musician Michael Bolton has the attention of a group of reporters as he tells… (JOHN WOIKE, HARTFORD COURANT )

March 28, 2010|By Story By ERIC R. DANTON |Photos By JOHN WOIKE

Michael Bolton likes to tell a story about how he found his voice.

It was 1985, and he had just released his second poorly selling rock album for Columbia when he received a summons: Al Teller, the head of the label, wanted to see him.

"It was like getting called to the principal's office," Bolton says during a recent cocktail party at his Westport estate, where he mingled with the media and played a handful of songs from his new record, "One World One Love" (out Tuesday on Universal, to coincide with a performance that night in Torrington).

Bolton was sure Teller was about to drop him from the label. Instead, the boss noted that Bolton had been writing adult-contemporary songs for other artists, who were landing them on the charts: Laura Branigan had hits with "How Am I Supposed To Live Without You" and "I Found Someone," which Cher later sang. Teller suggested that if Bolton wanted to make another album for Columbia, he should consider keeping such songs for himself. "He said, 'Stop giving hits away,'" Bolton says, smiling at the memory.

Good tip: His next album, 1987's "The Hunger," went double-platinum, quite a change for Bolton, who had been slogging it out on tour, opening for Ozzy Osbourne, just a few years earlier. Since that meeting with Teller 25 years ago, Bolton has sold more than 24 million albums in the United States alone as an adult-contemporary singer, and he has co-written songs with the likes of Bob Dylan and Diane Warren.

Lately, though, the New Haven native, 57, has strayed from putting out original material; his last such release was 2002's "Only a Woman Like You," which Bolton has followed with various tribute, covers and compilation albums.

"One World One Love" is a return to new songs, but this isn't Bolton the way you remember him circa "Soul Provider." These 12 tunes (including a pair of covers) are clearly aimed at today's pop charts, with contributions from high-profile collaborators Lady Gaga and Ne-Yo and a sleek R&B-tinged production sheen on radio-ready jams, courtesy of hotshot young production teams like the Jam.

"That was exciting for me and inspiring for me," Bolton says of working with his youthful collaborators. Later, he adds, "They're hungry to learn from you, and they want to be around as artists, so they look for people who have had long careers."

After snacks from a large round table in his dining room laden with sumptuous hors d'oeuvres and augmented by caterers bearing miniature lamb chops, bites of lobster and handmade spinach gnocchi, there was time for mingling and chit-chat over Grey Goose cranberry sparklers in the elegantly appointed wood-paneled entertainment room. (That display case against the wall near Ferdinand Roybet's painting "The Connoisseurs?" Why yes, those are real Grammys.)

Bolton, dressed in high-end, artfully ripped blue jeans, a fitted white button-down shirt open a few buttons down and a lush 3-button camel hair sport coat, looked tan and fit as he chatted amiably with the press. An old black-and-white photograph of him and some friends clustered around a Porsche parked on a New Haven street turned into a conversation piece about his musical roots in the local band the Nomads — "We played every place in New Haven that had live music," he said — and the singer listened graciously as one star-struck New York reporter explained that the first single he had ever bought as a kid was one of Bolton's.

Eventually, Bolton's publicists began herding the media out the door and down the driveway to his studio, where the singer played snippets of a handful of new songs from the CD.

"This is a most peculiar position to be in," he said, as his guests gathered around him in a circle.

Leaning against a console of knobs and faders in the basement studio, directly opposite the soundproof booth where he records his vocals, Bolton nodded along with the songs, eyes closed, tapping his hand against his thigh in time with the beat.

Although the album never wanders far from Bolton's comfort zone, there is plenty of stylistic variation.

"I didn't feel like there was a rule book for this," he says. "Every track didn't need to sound like the one before it."

Mostly, he was interested in writing, or finding, great songs.

"People are either going to love a song or not," he says. "You can have great beats or keyboards, but it doesn't mean anything if it's not a cool song."

The first tune he played, "Just One Love," starts with a simple piano arrangement that blossoms into a irresistible beat and stacked layers of vocals. Another, "Ready for You," makes a foray into slinky reggae. Ne-Yo sings with Bolton on "The Best," which features Auto-Tune vocals and a deep synthesizer vamp in the background. Gaga duets with Bolton on the catchy, slightly unnerving piano ballad "Murder My Heart."

"I realized how differently we might be perceived, and I said, 'We're going to have to write something that kills people,'" Bolton says. "She said, 'How about 'Murder My Heart?'"

Although Bolton's primary focus was on finding the right songs, the theme of togetherness emerged among the ones he wrote or chose ( Van Morrison's "Crazy Love" among them).

"I'm so over division, I can't tell you," he says. "It's not a political statement, but when are we going to get past everything that divides us and get to what unites us?"

t MICHAEL BOLTON performs Tuesday at the Warner Theatre, 68 Main St., Torrington. Tickets for the 7:30 p.m. show are $95, $55 and $45. Information: 860-489-7180.